Archive for November, 2006

The rainwater club staff is proud to inform its readers that Vishwanath is a published man !
You can read his artice in the recommandable web-newspaper India Together :http://www.indiatogether.org/2006/nov/env-meterh2o.htm
It is about the role of the meter in water supply in India.

ps: this kid is amongst the workers currently doing a new park in my neighborhood.

This snap has been taken last sunday, in that outskirt I wrote about yesterday.
It shows a quick-made filter before the water pumped (illegally) from the lake (polluted by sewage drains) enters in the rice field (that we Bangaloreans will eat).
Knowing that lots of open wells are already present on site and that we have all the skills to treat properly and cost-efficiently our waste water through decentralized systems : what are we waiting for ?
Public awarness and citizen responsabilization maybe.

This is a picture of the eastern outskirts of Bangalore.
Close to a lake, the land is percolated by spreaded open wells provided of abundant and good water, coming from the lake, filtered through the ground. The lap of time for the wells to recharge make it necessary for the famers to plan and control their water consumption, preventing water wastage.
Now this lake is the outlet of the city sewage drains. The farmers pump directly (illegally) the water from the lake. We eat the rice provided with such water (stolen and dirty).
Who says these wells don’t need to be respecting and used again ?

In the 70’s, scientist advised to whomever wanted to listen to drill bore wells.
W. N.Palmquist and D. Duba published in 1974 a Comparative analysis of drilled an dug well yield. After experiments with dug and drilled well, they truely observe that the mean yield of a drilled well is much more efficient than the mean inflow rate in dug wells. They logically conclude that the modern technology has to be the favourised option. After naturally admiting that the problem of lowering of the water table currently faced by the dug wells (shallow) due to pumping will never affect the deeper drilled wells.
How can we pretend controlling the evolution of the water in the aquifere ? How can we be so sure that human activity will never impact the groundwater at deeper level?
Similarely, M. Bassapa Reddy observes in A comparative study of drilled wells and dug wells (1975) that the annual quantities of groundwater recharge and withdrawn show a quantity of 6,601.48 mm^3 groundwater available for utilisation.
Regarding that with bore wells the yield is better, the space, time and expenditure are economized, he doesn’t think further before ensuring that the trend in favour of drilled wells is a positive step toward better utilization of groundwater ressources.
In a certain extend, this is true. Bore wells have contributed in increasing the use of groundwater ressource whose potential until this time was underexploited.

Several realities regarding the use of bore wells have to be understood.
While drilling a bore wells, we go through the weathered zone until reaching the bed rock.
The bed rock is a complex formation that include layers of different characteristics. It can be as highly fractured as totally full.
The success of the borewell is thus variable, depending on the nature of the rock it drills. And even if the rock drilled is full of cracks, who knows if these cracks are full of water ? And for how long ?

Moreover, the way borewells have been overspread and overexploited in the last 30 years is for a large part responsible of the drastic lowering of the groundwater table.
They are so easy to use that we have abuse of them, wasting big quantities of water. And of course never thinking in increasing the recharging rate, as we were explosing the drawn rate.

The actual statement is unavoidable : lowering of water table, death of very old dug wells, and always more bore wells also.

We have to realise that groundwater is a publig good. Thus its yield has to be regulated. And its recharge seriously thought.
Borewell can be used but in a wise way.

And we should think in revalorizing the use of open wells that offer many advantages.

Back to our will to improve public awerness of open wells and groundwater table in Bangalore.

Things are happening ! The farm journalist Shree Padre
(www.farmedia.org/profiles/Padre.html) will write an article in a kanada paper to recommend to all the people owning an open well contacting the rainwater club ! We are aiming to count 1006 wells and collect all informations
about their health, their water and its use. We hope that every well owner understand
what can be the role their wells play in future and how important it will be to preserve
them functionally but also culturally. If you, dear virtual-reader, is a Bangalorean happy well owner, let us know your existence.

And as good news never come alone, the governement will also help financially for the chemical analysis of the wells waters in a lab.

Because public understanding of this huge underground reservoir is a first step toward a sustainable management of our water supply, and the use of open wells
maybe the best tool to reach it.